Here's our next assignment: due December 3!
1. All read David Gere's “29 Effeminate Gestures: Choreographer Joe Goode and the Heroism of Effeminacy” and Purnima Shah's “Transcending Gender in the Performance of Kathak."
2. Give
feedback through theoretical lens: Sandra will concentrate on the work
itself, Cyn and Shy can also consider autobiographical more heavily.
3. Each come up with a few ideas about a choreographic assignment.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteHere's my response: https://docs.google.com/document/d/12vIgYyB53uXICjzlYz2NZQL_XoOAP2WANW0umwHDKTA/edit
ReplyDeleteChoreographic Ideas:
(1) Take a section of the existing kathak sequence and slowly morph it on a gender spectrum from ultra-femme to super butch.
(2) Think of three different autobiographical relationships that Cynthia has to kathak (examples: reverent disciple, Krishna bhakta, critical scholar, radical feminist, postmodern dancer). Understand being female as central to each of those positionalities. Think of three different scenarios that correspond to each of these roles (ie, Hari Krishna celebration, an academic lecture), and compose three different soundscapes, corresponding to each of the scenarios, that incorporate the existing “not enough” text.
Choreography Ideas:
ReplyDeleteCHOREOGRAPHY ASSIGNMENT IDEAS:
COME UP WITH TEXT, conjuring the imagination, that inverts the „rules of the body“ that you want to subvert in 29 SUBVERSIVE GESTURES, parallel to this section of David Gere's article:
„Imagine straight Wall Street brokers in their suits and ties, caressing the air with rounded palms while discussing the rise and fall of the NASDAQ index. Picture baseball players waving to fans with fluttering fingers. ... Conjure a world in which arms and hands would dance freely (Gere 2001, 351-352).
Based on Shah:
- Look at a gendered character from a classical Kathak wor: separate physical impersonation AND the emotional expression in terms of being gendered separately. Then figure out if and how they can be mixed/REmixed?? What will happen then?
- Repeat the switch from one gendered character to another with different transitions: once “blurring” the transition, another time making it fluid, and once emphasizing the rupture between the two characters
And my Reading Response:
DeleteAssignment 2: Reading 29 Subversive Gestures in terms of Gere and Shah
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eTfnYhLn15q17N6dPYl5UUC285VYsjzcxCw8p7aUow8/edit
DeleteShy's reading response: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YcRTb-bvgWYr3-YCxdOFVC6eDHsYks8ZQUkpscfdaw0/edit
ReplyDeleteChoreographic ideas:
1. make a set of “rules” that are verbalized for femininity as Gere does for masculinity on p 351 and p 365. Shah also has some descriptions on how masculinity should be performed in Kathak. Make these into a sound score and/or embody them.
2. Create an entrance with an over the top embodyment of femininity (like Goode starts with masculinity), maybe flirting with chair.
3. Create a series of masculine gestures in classical Kathak and pedestrian vocabularies.
4. Explore iconic props: Goode uses a chainsaw, a drill and a tea cup. Are there equivalents in Indian dance (Bow/arrow, lingam, trident, lotus...)? Create an exaggerated interaction with the prop that reiterates the gender it is normally associated with. Create an interaction that subverts it.
5. choose/create a line of text and perform variations of interpretation.
ReplyDeleteand other episodes to instumental changes?
Like “good enough” could be a pallavi. Cynthia is already exploring "She's a good girl" in the first and last chair sections, and I think these are two very effective moments. perhaps there are other ways it can be utilized?
6. Create a masculine footwork section and a feminine one...just play with feet or other parts of body? we have such a strong emphasis on arm, face and torso right now, perhaps we exclude upper body at times to see how gender can play out through other parts of the body.
ps. regarding number 1 above, Shah's description of masculinity in Kathak can be found on p 4.
Cyn and I have discussed this a lot, but I realized that neither of us wrote it as an assignment:
ReplyDeletecreate different sound scores for the existing feminine Kathak gestures.
Joe Goode uses the following sound choices for the same set of gestures:
1 silence
2 "too much" text
3 juxtaposition of masculine sounds
4 music (also creates more dancy embellishments to the gestures in this one)
5 singing